Becoming My Mother Watch, Part 1

I just spent a good ten minutes walking back and forth across the apartment, into the bedroom, the bathroom, the kitchen, and my office about three times each, looking for my sunglasses. When I was on the brink of tears because there was nowhere I hadn’t fucking looked, meaning my expensive prescription sunglasses were gone forever–and, more immediately, it would be no fun to go take a walk in the bright daylight–it occurred to me to check my head. Literally. And there they were, perched atop it like a headband, which is where they live about 75% of the time. (That in itself could be another entry in the Becoming My Mother Watch.)

If this is what it’s like at 33, I don’t even want to know how it’s gonna be in another 20 years.

I’m really hoping that a lot of my brain fog is due to the hormonal changes of menopause. I used to have an excellent memory, now I have to have routines and standard places to put things or I’ll forget them.

OTOH, I love and admire my Mom; and except for her fundamentalist religous beliefs, I’d love to get old just like her. That or Granny Weatherwax, but I don’t think I’ll ever have the overweening ego of GW.

I cried over my lost keys…they were sitting on the floor next to where I had put them on the table. never occurred to me to look down. I thought it was funny immediately though, which could just be a sign of insanity…but thats okay too.

My mom does this HORIFFICALLY ANNOYING martyr sigh when she really can’t believe how life is treating her, and I hate it. It’s that “not only are you the bane of my existence right now, but that also reminds me of every other shitty thing that has happened to me in my entire lifetime, so thanks for doing something that triggered all the memories” sigh. Of course, I now find myself making that exact same sigh all the damned time – once I caught myself in the mirror doing it, and I have the same facial expression and everything.

It’s that “not only are you the bane of my existence right now, but that also reminds me of every other shitty thing that has happened to me in my entire lifetime, so thanks for doing something that triggered all the memories” sigh.

This is, essentially, my mother’s life. ”Damn you children for being born in the first place, and continually annoying me with your demands for attention! And love! *SIGH* What do you want now?’

One day when I was still an apartment dweller I grabbed a Clorox wipe to wipe the lint off the door the the laundry closet in the kitchen (so very gross) next thing I knew I had scoured the entire kitchen and was prying the knobs off the stove to clean them and under them. On a beautiful Saturday when I could have been doing a slew of fun/interesting things.

That day 6 years ago, was the day i knew i was (at age 24) becoming my mother

god, that’s what I’m like at 22. I put something down and turn around and then I have to spend twenty minutes searching my tiny dorm room for it.

I get to blame both my parents, though my mother is definitely the worse offender.

The best though, was when my then-boyfriend made a detour to my house on the way (really not on the way) to a show his band was playing, to look for his latest paycheck that he was convinced was in my room…and was actually in his pocket.

Heh. I can’t remember ever NOT being like that. I remember when I was a teenager there was this one bracelet I used to lose off my wrist all the time because the clasp kept getting stuck, and my brother always used to be able to find it in seconds — looking in the exact same spot I just looked at and didn’t find it in. And no, I don’t think there was any way for him to have stolen and hidden it since every time I lost it, it was on my physical being, in a locked bedroom. It’s why I never really bothered with marijuana; what was the point, when I was already a permanent resident of Planet Claire?

emmy: “But, I have always been this way. Total scatterbrain. As my own dear mommy would say, “I don’t have ADD, I’m just.. Oh, look, a chicken!””

LOL…yeah, in my family, we have the “Is that an eagle?” joke, thanks to my easily-distracted mother. It’s weird to watch my mother become my grandmother, and she’s definitely the most likely of the 5 sisters to do so. My mom’s fairly prim and reserved about a lot of things, though, I’m looking forward eagerly to her 70th birthday (still 13 years off) to see if she loses the brain-to-mouth filter like my grandma did. Grandma was awesome. :)

Not sure I’m going to turn into my mom yet. I’m a bit too much like my dad, I think.

I’m much more like my dad, but it scares me how much I can be like my mom when my daughter Katie and I are opposite on anything. My mom and I had a very oppositional and angry relationship in my teens. I hasten to add that I was as much to blame as she. We’re both stubborn. Otherwise we were complete opposits. And we both had undiagnosed, untreated PTSD.

So, yeah.

I do catch myself saying dad things. Like “Shut the door, we’re not heating THE WHOLE WORLD!” Also, I tend to overexplain anything within my scientific purview. I think I just overexplained meses today when my twins asked about the tampons in my car.

My mother reads things out loud, and my “things” I mean “everything”. This made my childhood road trips interminable.
But now, I find that I do it as well. I try to distract myself, and not annoy my companions, by always having other materials that I can read silently to myself, but I have come to understand that Mom was NOT trying to be annoying she was just really interested in the things around her. Since I have embraced the idea that this is a good way to be, I don’t mind so much when she does it or when I find myself doing it.

Meowser, boy, do I hear you. I don’t know how many times I have gone through my purse looking for something 3 or 4 times, then gone and complained to my husband that I’ve “looked everywhere” and it’s “just gone.” He asks if I have checked my purse and I say “Yes! I checked it 3 times already!” But just to prove it’s not there, I march back over to my purse with an irritated sigh, reach in, and as often as not (or so it seems) immediately pull out whatever I was looking for. I have no idea how this happens.

I know I’m like my mother. Some parts of this I don’t mind (her compassion and tenderheartedness for example), but other things–oh, the passive-aggressiveness–I am actively fighting against. Such as a recent example where she informed me that my SIL’s graduation ceremony was on such-and-such a date, when I had just the previous day arranged to run a race with my friend on that day. I said as much and before even waiting to hear me say “but that’s OK, I’ll just cancel,” she pursed up her mouth in an expression that clearly said “I expected you to disappoint me, and you have exceeded my expectations” and said “Oh, well, that’s FINE, I’ll just tell her you can’t make it.” It’s like she always anticipates the worst from me even before I do it (that I won’t be able to come for Mother’s Day, or that I don’t want to spend time with her, or that I’m going to “overreact” to something), but feels she can’t call me directly on things that disappoint her because I’ll “get mad,” so she just sends the message through body language instead. Because that doesn’t drive me nuts or anything.

I love her, and no doubt I will end up exactly the same way, but holy crap I want to kill her sometimes.

Heh. I’ve worn contacts for the past three years, but when I wipe my eyes, I still make the motion to go under the rims of my glasses. I’ve also removed my glasses out of habit before bedtime only to find that I’m wearing contacts.

It’s amazing how old habits die hard! (Which is probably why so many of us find learning to love our bodies in whatever shape they are so hard!)

Hehe. I determined that I was turning into my mother when, after a night of Chinese takeout and videos in college, I made everyone plates of leftovers to take home. Not that being my mom would be a bad thing; aside from being occasionally irritating, she’s mostly awesome.

I’d also be happy to get old-ish like Nanny Ogg. But that’s just me. :D

Heh, yeah I’ve always been that way too. Although I’ve never done the glasses thing (I never put them on my head). I don’t get it from my mom though, actually it drives my mom nuts. I get it from my grandma on my dad’s side.

Unfortunately I do have my mom’s temper and tendency to take it out on whoever is convenient, which is something I’m trying very hard to work on.

Dh and I were off to the mall to insure the cars one evening. We have two cars; one is a 4 door sedan, the other is a suv with a cartop carrier on it.
As we drove into the underground parking lot, I shrieked and told dh, we’ll never make it under the height restriction board.
We made it, but I tsked tsked DH about hitting the sign as it was swinging to and fro.DH never said a word.
I realized as we came back to the car, that we had driven the short 4 door sedan to the mall, and had easily cleared the restriction.
I have a one-way ticket to Looneyville, departing now on the upper deck.

My grandmother complains about things she relates to her old age (forgetfulness, inability to perform some tasks, confusion) and it worries me that I’m not a lot better than her but I’m over 40 years younger! I’m going to be completely incapacited by the time I’m 50. dang.

This weekend, I went to the shop for loo roll THREE TIMES and came home without any. The fourth time, I went with my daughter and said to her we must buy loo roll! We even went down the Toilet Tissue aisle and got distracted by the other thing I’d been forgetting – cat food (don’t worry, we did have Some, just Not Much) – and still got to the front of the queue before I Realised. Luckily I had a Small Person who was keen to earn Helpfulness Points by running and getting some…

I can never find important articles of clothing (like socks and work uniform shirts) or textbooks or my wallet and its always the minute before work/class when i realize this. my partner is the only person who can find my things. EVAHR.
I’m almost starting to think he hides them so he can make me think i need him around to find my shit. lol.

It’s like she always anticipates the worst from me even before I do it… [snip]… but feels she can’t call me directly on things that disappoint her because I’ll “get mad,” so she just sends the message through body language instead. Because that doesn’t drive me nuts or anything.

EXACTLY – and then she says, “I don’ t know why So-and-so thinks I’m critical, I never said a word“.

I seem to have been becoming my mother for years, but nothing brought it home more than what happened in the subway several years ago.

My husband and I were going somewhere, and he had on a nice white shirt. We were waiting on the platform (our platform is outside), and he leaned against the wall with his shoulder. All of a sudden, out of the depths of my soul, these words surged and rushed out of my mouth: “DON’T YOU LEAN ON THAT, IT’S DIRTY!!!”

Oh. My. Gosh… I sounded just like her. The funniest part was that he IMMEDIATELY straightened right up. I apologized right away and we both laughed uproariously… Obviously, those “tapes” work both ways…

Well, I’m in my fifties, and stuff like looking for the car keys that I am already holding in my hands happens so often now that I don’t even notice it!

So from my point of view, since I barely notice when I have put already put on my watch, until I start to put on a *second* watch (hey, I’m in my fifties, I can’t keep track of a cell phone) (also, I can’t keep track of watches so I have 3 identical ones so I can always find one in a hurry) I have alarming occurrences *less* often than I used to.

But hey, my syntax is still astoundingly complex, always a sign of a robust intellect. Or something.

I always swore I would not carry a purse because my Mother’s was always a bottomless cavern. But, yeah, that didn’t last and I do have to search through mine repeatedly to find items.

My Mom is a notorious lighter theif too. I’ve inhereted that trait. To curb my theivery, my husband has taken to purchasing lighters with dragons or the Statue Of Liberty, so he’s able to identfy the stolen lighter and scold me for it. I no longer take any lighter with a picture on it.

And one more thing….not sure if this applies to all Mothers, but it does to mine and my Mother-in-law….but they’re so out of touch with current pop-culture, but still try to be revelant. My brother and I have talked about writing a book of “Mom Sayings”….because they’re just so off the wall. At one point my Mother was discussing rap, and granted this was back in the 90’s…but she said she enjoyed:

At the gym the other day, I was heading for the elliptical when I realized I’d forgotten my water bottle. So I set down my book, iPod, and… water bottle, and headed back to the changeroom. The bottle wasn’t in my locker, so I figured I must have left it somewher in the gym when I’d been doing weight training earlier. So I head back out, and see my water bottle…next to my iPod and book.

I also used to always check the refrigerator when I couldn’t find my keys, since I would quite often get home and head immediately for the fridge for the Brita pitcher. That was in my early 20s, so I’m going to be terrible when I get older!

Gah! That was my grandma! Every time I read a sign out loud in the car for no apparent reason, I want to smack myself in the face.

I have also caught myself reading menus to Al, while he’s already reading the same damned menu across the table. “Oh! There’s halibut! You like halibut!’ As if that would never have dawned on him without my mentioning it. My mom did that all the time–and it was ten times worse when I was a vegetarian. The worst part here is, Al was a vegetarian when I met him, so I commiserated with him when he complained about going out to eat with his parents and hearing, “Oh, they have salad! They have polenta! You can eat polenta!” YES, I KNOW, AND I CAN READ. But now he’s an omnivore again, and I still occasionally feel the need to tell him what he can plainly see. Sigh.

Well, you didn’t expect your mother to show up here, now, did you? On behalf of martyred mothers everywhere, I’d just like to say that we’re tired.

It’s hard to remain patient and perky when you have a job that is literally 24/7 for years that you can’t quit. You can divorce a husband, but children are forever. And the world will be happy to critique your work!

I also think that bad habits are made when your first 10,000 or so conversations with a person are when that person is under 5 years old. You get in the habit of speaking in a way that is totally detrimental to good communication. And did I mention the tired thing?

For those of you who feel your mother wishes you were never born, every so often she does, no question. Everyone would like to have a little less to worry about in life, even setting aside the actual work. But wishing your life didn’t include the burden of childrearing is not to be confused with wishing that your child did not exist. I know that sounds strange but it’s true. I adore my two children, and at 20 and 16 they are AMAZING. The world would be a lot less wonderful if they didn’t exist. But Jesus, I’m tired. I’m tired of being responsible and having to be strong and to handle whatever it is. I won’t feel this way next week, but I feel this way today and if that leaks out, I guess they’ll feel like the children of a martyred mother. And they’ll be right.

Oh, here’s a good one. I was teaching, and a couple of freshmen in the back of the room were watching a movie on a laptop quite obviously. I tried to ignore it, but finally when they laughed at something I snapped and yelled “You two in the back STOP IT!” with the pointed enunciation and everything, just like I do to my kids. I mean, it was perfect mom voice, and I’ve never used that tone in a class before. Their mothers must all sound the same way, because the entire class straightened up in unison. :)

I just splurfed; thanks. ;) I can usually distract my mom now from her rants with any topic about birds or squirrels…

[i]I’d also be happy to get old-ish like Nanny Ogg. [/i]

Amen! Say what you mean, mean what you say. I’m working on that now though cause really I do think honesty is best in all situations; it is just phrasing that makes all the difference!

And to losing things; I SWEAR there are poltergeists that do it…although reading comments I like thinking of them as brownies a bit better…they MOVE things. I KNOW it! I will LOOK and look and look in the SAME damned place…and not find what I’m looking for. Then, frustrated to hell; I cast one last glance in that direction and POOF there it is… (Same thing with my purse…no matter HOW SMALL it is…or how few items I have IN it!)

Although Adam swears I found a small “pocket dimension” in our old couch….lost the remote under the cushion and despite taking all cushions OFF, and searching repeatedly; we didn’t “find” it until we were sitting on it and I stuffed my hand under the cushion!

I do this all the time too – both the sunglasses on the head and the not being able to find them when that’s where they are.

My mother never does this.

There are some traits of my mom’s that I would love to have (i.e., ability to be organized), but god help me if I ever think that tapered stretch pants (and probably hemmed too short) are acceptable to wear in public.

When I was an RA in college each RA had a copy of the key that gave you access to the buildings master. I misplaced my keys and nearly caused a staff meltdown. The whole staff tore apart my room looking for the keys before someone opened the drawer under where i usually threw them. Apparently they had fallen in when i had grabbed socks. Unfortunately I haven’t gotten much more organized in the years since.

I do this ALL THE FREAKIN’ TIME!!!!!!
Just a few minutes ago, I reminded myself to put my daughter’s vest on (for the school bus. It’s a safety garment-thing.) So, what do I do, not 2 minutes later? Bring her out to the bus WITHOUT THE VEST.

I keep trying to open the door to my home with my remote car keychain – you know, the button that says ‘unlock’ for your car doors? I just keep pressing the button over and over until i realize that the house door won’t go ‘click’!

“I have also caught myself reading menus to Al, while he’s already reading the same damned menu across the table. “Oh! There’s halibut! You like halibut!’ As if that would never have dawned on him without my mentioning it.”
“Oh, they have salad! They have polenta! You can eat polenta!” YES, I KNOW, AND I CAN READ”

Oh my… I didn’t realize i did this too until I read it here. That’s very disturbing.

I freaked out this morning looking for my keys. They were in my hand. Oh, yes, I had already picked them up without noticing.

Oh, good, I’m not the only one! I did this when I was working at Waldenbooks, and all the closing workers were getting our coats, etc., and walking to the front of the store to leave. I started panicking because I couldn’t find my keys in my purse, and we couldn’t lock the door before I knew I hadn’t left them somewhere in the back room. That’s when I realized that, while I was rifling through the purse with my right hand, I had the keys in my left.

Ha! I spent about thirty seconds the other day looking blankly at the dirty plate in my hand, wondering what happened to the magazine I was holding between me loading the dishwasher and me getting to the sofa…and I can now conclusively report to you that most magazines are not, in fact, dishwasher safe.

I have also caught myself reading menus to Al, while he’s already reading the same damned menu across the table.

I do this too, but it’s deliberate. I’m married to a wonderful, caring, sexy man who has a huge blind spot when it comes to menus. He’ll read one section, pick something from it even if it isn’t something he wants, and then grumble about it later. When I ask something like “well, why didn’t your order a hamburger then?” he’ll respond “What? They had hamburgers on the menu? Where were they?”

*sigh*

So in order to save myself grief I have started to point out things like “did you see the hamburgers?” or “those soups sound really good”. Even though he has the same menu in front of him that I do.

As for the age thing….my current fun one is walking into the kitchen for a specific reason and completely spacing it in the 10 feet between the kitchen and the computer. Getting old is pigeon poop.

As for the age thing….my current fun one is walking into the kitchen for a specific reason and completely spacing it in the 10 feet between the kitchen and the computer. Getting old is pigeon poop.

Yeah, I definitely do that now, and I’m 21. I have also done the thing where I look everywhere for something, and then either a) realize that it was on my person, or b) have someone else immediately find the thing in an extremely obvious place where I swear I looked. It’s gotten to the point where if I don’t find something fairly rapidly, I go find backup. Because the thing-moving imps don’t like me.

In some ways, I don’t mind turning into my mother a little bit, because she’s one of the coolest women I know. In other ways… I’m 21. It’s creepy.

I keep trying to open the door to my home with my remote car keychain – you know, the button that says ‘unlock’ for your car doors? I just keep pressing the button over and over until i realize that the house door won’t go ‘click’!

I am SO GLAD I’m not the only one who does this. My husband thinks it’s hilarious. I also tend to try to turn lamps/my computer off with the t.v. remote.

For those of you who feel your mother wishes you were never born, every so often she does, no question. Everyone would like to have a little less to worry about in life, even setting aside the actual work. But wishing your life didn’t include the burden of childrearing is not to be confused with wishing that your child did not exist.

That is undoubtedly true for many (most?) people, but it is also true that some people’s mothers (and fathers) honestly wish they had never been born. I don’t want to go into personal (painful) detail, but I think it’s probably kinder not to assume that people who say things like, “My mother wishes I had never been born” are exaggerating.

HIJACK- Right now, I really wish that my “I am Kate Harding” t-shirt was telling the truth…I just received an email that next there will be several lectures on “Celebrating Science” at my university. Well, I opened that attachment, and lo and behold, a whole week of seminars on obesity!! The first one will be presented by the Chief Obesity Research Scientist at Eli fucking Lilly. The title of his presentation is “Discovering Drugs to Treat Subtypes of Obesity”.

GRRRR. I would like to respond to this somehow… does anyone have any advice?

I am so glad to hear other people chiming in on this. I’m 25, and I’ve always been totally absent-minded, too. I get so frustrated when people go on about how they can’t remember anything because they’re old — dude, I’ve *never* been able to remember where I put stuff! Count yourself lucky that you had a memory to begin with! Of course, my favorites are the people who say things like “Oh, you can’t be forgetting your keys, you’re so young!” Absent mindedness? Not just a sign of aging, people!

Ummm, apparently I have strong repressed feelings here. Sorry for the rant. ;-)

But wishing your life didn’t include the burden of childrearing is not to be confused with wishing that your child did not exist.

OlderThanDirt, it’s good to hear from the other side of the fence on this and I’m sure that’s true for the vast majority of parents. But let me second Colleen: some people’s parents really do wish their children had never been born, and the children know it. I appreciate that you meant well, but it’s hurtful to dismiss that as a legitimate feeling. Especially since those people have probably had a lifetime’s quota of having their feelings dismissed as irrelevant, you know?

And as I read through the comments, dissolving periodically in giggles when I recognize my sisteren (and their moms and grands) in spirit, I rejoice in the fact that when friends shake their heads in dismay about my ABSOLUTE RIGIDITY when it comes to handbag design throughout life — and my ABSOLUTE REFUSAL to change bags in deference to fashion unless I’m attending, say, an inaugural ball — I will be able to point them to this thread with grace and a smile.

and I can now conclusively report to you that most magazines are not, in fact, dishwasher safe.

LOL. Yes. And in a similar vein, I can also conclusively report that running instant coffee through the coffee machine will result in two very distinct truths: 1. There will be NO GROUNDS in the filter. 2. Instant coffee was never intended to be perkalated (sp). Yep. Ahh….good times

….and heaven help me if mechanical can-openers are ever discontinued in favor of those damned electronic doo-hickies. I will be doomed to open cans with knives at the risk of bodily harm ’cause I swear the gods of can-opening goodness LAUGH at me any time I aproach the electric openers… ;)

My husband is the most humorous offender of these kinds of things in our house. I like to tease him that he can never find something until he actually says the magic words: “honey, have you seen my ______?”

The only thing that really annoys me though, is when he uses my toothbrush. For some reason, I can’t bring myself to use it again after he has, so he’s got about 5 right now (not exaggerating), and I have one. We have tried crazy colors and now we are trying to keep mine in a separate toothbrush holder/cup thing on the opposite side of the countertop.

I do a lot of the kinds of things mentioned above. I think that for a lot of us it is a matter of paying attention and being present in the moment, which I rarely am. Working on it for many reasons, not just for finding my keys. :)

Me, I’m hoping to be like Diana Trent from the BBC comedy Waiting for God when I get old: cantakerous, mayhem-making, and prone to whacking people with my cane. Although being like Granny Weatherwax would be cool, too.

Now, I’m chronically disorganized and I do lose stuff at a rate of knots, but that’s always just been me. My mother is chronically the other way – you couldn’t leave anything out around our house without it being tidied away. Cleanliness was way, way above godliness (and a lot of other things) for her, always. It may or may not be connected, but she’s now got full-blown OCD, of the type where she ‘has’ to count things all the time, and I dread seeing any tendency towards that in myself.

But let me second Colleen: some people’s parents really do wish their children had never been born, and the children know it.

And let me third Colleen on that, Caitlin. It’s a huge taboo, which is why people want to deny it . But it happens.

I’ll purposefully cross the 8 feet into my living room then stand there and wrack my brains trying to remember what it was I was looking for. If I don’t have whatever it is in my hand, I’ll completely forget what I’m doing. Sometimes having it in my hand doesn’t help either.

No, OlderThanDirt, I absolutely understood what you were saying and it was heartfelt and enlightening . I was just pointing out that sadly that’s not always the case — and while that’s not pretty, it’s a truth worth acknowledging. Please don’t feel your post was wasted.

OlderThanDirt, like Caitlin said, your post was not wasted at all. I absolutely empathize with mothers who are just bone-tired, and I was not trying to imply in any way that you didn’t love your children. I’m sorry if it came off that way to you, because that was certainly not my intent.

I was just trying to make the point that it can really hurt to be questioned on your own life experience, and that it can be problematic to assume that one’s own experiences are universal. That’s all. Again, I am sorry you were hurt by my words.

Colleen and Caitlin, I should never have posted on a day that felt like Thursday. I was so upset by your reaction and I was fuming, “I never said that my experience was universal” then went back and read my own post which says “for those of you…”. Sigh.

You’ve no doubt moved on, but I wanted to say, point taken about universality. And thanks for being tender with me, I actually cried when I read your reactions to my second post. It has been the kind of week where the kindness of strangers is almost too wonderful to bear.

I’m slowly but surely gaining a tendency from my father’s side of the family – one toward misplacing words. Both my father and his older brother have this habit of stopping in the middle of a sentence and searching for the appropriate word (which means the rare gatherings of both families can turn out quite interesting, with four children and two spouses filling in the blanks in the conversation for them). I’m starting to do the same. It’s been gathering speed lately, and the implications are chilling. Who knows, by the time I’m fifty, I could be proclaiming whole sentences of metasyntactic filler (“Thingy wossname whosamajig thingummy whatsit doodah.”) rather than coming out with sane conversation.

Fortunately, I can generally find the correct word when I’m typing.

(Oh, and I’m with the people who want to grow up to be either Granny Weatherwax or Diana Trent. I figure I’m going to be a cranky old woman anyway – may as well do it with style).